Students With a Dream take majority of executive positions

St. James campus director and international student representative races separated by 18 votes

According to unofficial results, the Students With a Dream (SWAD) slate have won the lion’s share of executive positions in the Student Association’s (SA) elections, including a contested race for the director of education position.

The SA funds The Dialog.

Arnel Fleurant (SWAD) edged Students First candidate Kavi Ramgoolam by 112 votes to become the SA’s new director of education. Fleurant, who is currently sitting on the board as the Black students’ representative, said he doubted himself during the campaign but the outcome shows that he did enough to win.

“Going into the position, I already had a mindset of how I was going to approach the position and what I was going to do,” Fleurant said. “I had already set some goals for myself.”

The incoming director of education said his first priority when he takes office in May is to make the process of setting the SA’s agenda for the year more organized.

Four out of the five SA executive positions were uncontested, and candidates needed a majority of “Yes” votes on ballots in order to win. Including Fleurant’s election, SWAD candidates took every executive position except for director of equity, which was won by Kizzie St. Clair, an independent.

The director of equity position was originally contested between St. Clair and Mercedes Burrowes, who was the director of campus life. Burrowes dropped out of the race on March 5.

Many of the SWAD candidates who won were on the board last year. Kushagra Manchanda was re-elected as the director of operations, a position he was first elected to in a byelection in December. He was previously the international students constituency representative.

Jasmyn St. Hiliare won the director communications and internal. She was previously the Casa Loma campus director. Alex Stewart, who was the director of equity, is now the director of campus life.

Two races in the elections, the St. James campus director and international student representative, came down to just an 18 vote difference, according to unofficial results.

Shelly Garcia, who ran as an independent, edged incumbent Calvin Bartholomew-Soto (SWAD) to claim the St. James campus director position.

“I feel like people wanted something new, they wanted to see an improvement,” Garcia said. “And they saw that in me as an individual.”

Asif Farabi placed third in the race.

Chief returning officer Charles Wilson has ordered a recount of the votes for St. James campus director, which had a difference of 7.3 per cent between the top two candidates.

In the contest between Erick Almeide Japor (SWAD) and Aman Kapshyap (Students First) for international students representative, Almeide Japor won with 561 votes to Kapshyap’s 543.

The votes for international student representative will be automatically recounted as the margin of victory was less than five per cent.

Both Kapshyap and Almeide Japor did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Votes for the elections were counted on March 28 but the elections team delayed the publication of the results for a day as they were waiting for the registrar’s office to authenticate 18 outstanding ballots, which had not happened as of press time.

According to Wilson, the recounts will happen on April 4 and 5, with official results to follow.

I am the editor-in-chief of The Dialog, but I also drink too much coffee and play hockey like it's my job. Please send story tips, corrections, and sarcastic remarks to dialogeic@sagbc.ca Tweets: @steve_cornwell